Chapter 18 Summary

Birle rises while it is still dark and prepares the supplies she will take to Orien. On impulse, she tells Yul where she is going. Birle is stopped by soldiers at the gate to the city, but they assume she is meeting a lover, or luring maids to Corbel's bed, and let her pass. Birle finds the house Orien described. It is the rudest shack in the worst part of the city, but the hovel stands empty. The slave chains outside hang limp. A dirty, diseased girl from the next house tells Birle they have taken the slave to the mines already.

Joaquim tries to console Birle. He tells her Lady Fortune has a wheel, and the fates of all men are bound to it. Nothing but chance dictates whether they rise or fall. In the mines, Joaquim tells her, the best she...